Friday, January 23, 2015



Seems like reviews from last night's premiere aren't very encouraging, but I took time out of a busy schedule to watch the first show.  Over dinner, so I was multitasking.

Hart Hansen, the show's creator, also gave television audiences BONES, which I've enjoyed because of the quirky characters.  In this series, Backstrom is no less quirky than Temperance Brennan and her crew.

I enjoyed the first episode and am looking forward to more.  I thought there was plenty of fun and plenty of zingers, not to mention a really twisty plot.

Caught My Eye



Forensic science, magic, mystery, and romance mix in this edgy steampunk fantasy—a retelling of the horror classic, in which Dr. Eliza Jekyll, daughter of the infamous Dr. Henry Jekyll—pursues a dangerous murderer in an alternate Victorian London.

In an electrified Victorian London, Dr. Eliza Jekyll is a crime scene investigator, hunting killers with newfangled technological gadgets. She will need every advantage available to catch a terrifying new psychopath splattering London with blood. Hidden in the grimy shadows, the fiendish murderer preys on beautiful women, drugging them before slicing off their limbs. Finding the “Slicer” can make Eliza’s career . . . or unmask her darkest secret. Like her father, she has a hidden second self that emerges when she drinks his forbidden magical elixir. Just a few sips, and a seductive and impulsive Lizzie Hyde is unleashed.

The members of the Royal Society do not trust Eliza, and they send their enforcer, the mercurial Captain Lafayette, to prove she’s a dangerous sorceress. The careful doctor knows that one wrong step can make her prey to the clever Lafayette, a man who harbors an evil curse of his own. No matter how much she craves the elixir, she must resist.

But as the Slicer case draws her into London’s luminous magical underworld, Eliza will need the potion’s power to help her . . . even if it might attract the attentions of Lafayette. .
Even if it means setting the wild Lizzie free. . .

Saturday, January 17, 2015

A Review of Interest to Me!

 
Review here!

On sale now for 99¢!

 
CURSED LAND

Army Scout Sam Blaylock rode into the small Texas town of Shooter's Cross looking for deserters, not trouble.

While up in the mountains, he discovered a wilderness plagued by nature and haunted by superstition, but one that he thought he could tame with his experience and strong back.

He didn't know he was going to have to kill to keep the home he planned for his family, but he didn't let that stop him. Sam had been looking for a home for his family for years. That search had been interrupted by the Civil War.

Now Sam is putting down roots, and not even the Devil himself can stand in the way.
 
 

Thursday, January 08, 2015

The Lawyer: Stay of Execution

 
In the Old West, J.D. Miller had been an attorney at law. A respected and successful one. Until the horrific, soul-scarring day when he returned home to find his entire family gruesomely slaughtered—the charred remains scarcely recognizable in the smoldering ruins of what had once been their house. Like a phoenix rising out of the ashes, The Lawyer—a killing machine—was born, and he’s leaving a blood-splattered revenge trail as he searches out those who murdered his family.

THE LAWYER: STAY OF EXECUTION is the first novella in a thrilling new hard-boiled Western series by bestselling Amazon author Wayne D. Dundee (Manhunter’s Mountain, The Empty Badge) and BEAT to a PULP books. Based on characters created by Edward A. Grainger, author of the Cash Laramie and Gideon Miles adventures.
 
Click here.

Wednesday, January 07, 2015

Getting lots of nice words on this one!

 
Great reviews and made some good SF lists!
 
It's out on January 27 but you can pre-order now!

 
REALLY looking forward to this movie. Looks fun!
 

Monday, January 05, 2015

A Blend of Science and History

 
I love books on history and science, generally in that order, so I had to order this one!
 
A powerful defense of intellectual freedom told through the ordeals of contemporary scientists attacked for exploring controversial ideas, by a noted science historian and medical activist
 
An investigation of some of the most contentious debates of our time, Galileo’s Middle Finger describes Alice Dreger’s experiences on the front lines of scientific controversy, where for two decades she has worked as an advocate for victims of unethical research while also defending the right of scientists to pursue challenging research into human identities.
 
Dreger’s own attempts to reconcile academic freedom with the pursuit of justice grew out of her research into the treatment of people born intersex (formerly called hermaphrodites). The shocking history of surgical mutilation and ethical abuses conducted in the name of “normalizing” intersex children moved her to become a patient rights’ activist. By bringing evidence to physicians and the public, she helped change the medical system.
 
But even as she worked to correct these injustices, Dreger began to witness how some fellow liberal activists, motivated by identity politics, were employing lies and personal attacks to silence scientists whose data revealed inconvenient truths. Troubled, she traveled around the country digging up sources and interviewing the targets of these politically motivated campaigns. Among the subjects she covers in the book are the anthropologist Napoleon Chagnon, falsely accused in a bestselling book of committing genocide against a South American tribe; the psychologist Michael Bailey, accused of abusing transgender women; and the evolutionary biologist E. O. Wilson, accused of fomenting rightwing ideas about human nature. Galileo’s Middle Finger describes Dreger’s long and harrowing journey back and forth between the two camps for which she felt equal empathy: social justice warriors and researchers determined to put truth before politics.
 
As scientific discoveries increasingly complicate our traditional ideas about human identity and behavior, Dreger poses an urgent question: How do we balance social justice and scientific freedom when these ideals seem to be in open conflict? As she shows was the case with Galileo, in spite of how scientists and activists may think their values differ, justice and truth are inextricably bound up. Galileo’s Middle Finger ultimately makes the case for treating the quest for evidence as essentially sacred, and doing so specifically to advance justice.